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KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A University of Kansas freshman took a break from shooting hoops with friends
outside his dormitory to talk about what some students call “study pills.”

As final exams approached last semester, he took a couple doses of a prescribed stimulant called
Adderall. “But all they did was make me feel nervous,” said the chemical-engineering major. “I’m
off of it now.”

He still has a vial of leftover pills he used for his attention issues in high school. And that’s
why he asked that his name not appear in this article: He didn’t want to be pressed by dormmates
to supply them with an illegal focus boost for upcoming finals.

The controlled stimulants that many college students seek, if only for a momentary edge, carry
familiar brand names such as Adderall, Vyvanse, Focalin and Ritalin. They’re all standard drugs for
treating attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder, often successfully.

Their misuse, however, is thought to be on the rise at campuses nationwide — creating a health
hazard and trips to the emergency room for students not diagnosed for ADHD.

“The only people who don’t know about it are the parents,” said University of Kentucky
communications professor Alan D. DeSantis. “I’m sure the majority of my students will be using
Adderall at some time during finals week. It’s really built into the climate and culture of today’s
college life.”

DeSantis has analyzed several years’ worth of surveys of Kentucky undergraduates to conclude
that at least one-third of the student body has taken ADHD medication without prescriptions. An
additional 8 percent use the drugs legally under a doctor’s supervision, he said, and half of them
provide pills to other students.

Assessing a variety of surveys, a 2008 study published in the
Journal of American Child Adolescent Psychiatry offered a not-so-precise range of 5
percent to 35 percent of college-age people taking attention-deficit stimulants not prescribed for
them.

A University of Missouri survey found a usage rate in between.

About 12 percent in a sample of Missouri students admitted to using controlled stimulants or
painkillers, prescribed or illegally, said Kim Dude, director of the university’s Wellness Resource
Center. “Eighty-five percent of the students don’t use any of that.”

This month, data-miners at Brigham Young University issued a study that tracked Twitter
references to study pills.

Searching keywords such as “Adderall,” “college” and “cramming” over a six-month period, lead
researcher Carl Hanson allowed, “We don’t have all the answers” on the frequency of legal use or
abuse. But the study did conclude that tweets about the drug were heaviest among students in the
U.S. Northeast and South, and lightest among students in the Plains and Southwestern states
(including California).

Millions of Americans have taken prescribed ADHD medication — often intermittently — without
experiencing negative side effects. But an under-30 generation raised on the practice might not be
aware of the dangers of taking even modest dosages without a thorough diagnosis, said psychiatrist
Tahir Rahman of the Missouri University School of Medicine.

“If you’re depressive or have bipolar disorder, taking a drug such as Adderall could be throwing
gasoline on a fire,” Rahman said.

Nationwide, the number of emergency-room visits related to abuse of ADHD drugs rose to 31,224 in
2010 — more than double the number recorded five years earlier, according to a federal report
released in January.

Such ER visits by people ages 18 to 25 nearly quadrupled in that time, the Substance Abuse &
Mental Health Association reported, thought it’s unknown how many of those patients were college
students.

Colleges across the country are tightening their procedures to limit student access to stimulant
medicine.

“Some campuses have outright stopped prescribing stimulants,” said Stacy Andes of the American
College Health Association. Others, including Kansas University, require students to present copies
of at least two diagnostic tests given by doctors or mental-health professionals.

The drugs easily can be obtained off campus in most college towns, DeSantis said. A clinic or
family practitioner may ask patients to fill out a questionnaire that asks whether they have
trouble focusing or completing assignments.

“For the most part, students (seeking medication) know how to answer those questions,” DeSantis
said.